In honour of International Women’s Day happening this week, I wanted to shed light on 5 female artists and critics that have inspired me, not only through my Art History degree, but on a personal level. Unfortunately, as in many other industries, most female artists throughout history have not been given the platform that they deserve and have often been overshadowed by their male counterparts.
In many cases, female artists who were the wives of great male artists, did not receive half the recognition that their husbands did. Rather, they were written about in relation to their husbands and hardly recognised for the body of work that they created individually. The most obvious example that comes to mind is Berthe Morisot, married to Eugène Manet and associated with her notorious brother-in-law Edouard Manet, the figurehead of the Impressionist movement.
As an art geek, I have come to realise the tragic lack of female representation in the Western art canon – not to mention the non-existence of females from minority groups. Thankfully today, the prominent females within academia and journalism have become the voices for the stories of female artists that matter, who in their own time, were oppressed by the patriarchy.
Katy Hessel
Katy Hessel has been a recent discovery for me, but I am utterly obsessed with her. Not only is she living my dream job, but after recently attending her talk ‘Art and Power in World History’ at the Victoria and Albert Museum, and reading her book The History of Art Without Men (a Sunday Times Best seller), I have come to discover more of her amazing work to champion female artists both from the past and present. In her podcast ‘The Great Women Artists’, she interviews both contemporary artists and academics, specializing in past female figures, such as Griselda Pollock (another legend) on polish sculptor Alina Szapocznikow. She is all about redefining the art canon and repainting an art history that gives the same importance to the unsung heroes that have defined the art that we know of today. She is also a regular columnist on The Guardian, Financial Times, and The Observer, so keep an eye out for her!
Shirin Neshat
I discovered Shirin Nishat, whilst studying for my Art History A Level and, in light of the ongoing protests in Iran surrounding the veil, her voice and works has become even more vital. Her photograph Rebellious Silence, is a visual allegory that embodies all the women who endured the Islamic Revolution. It is a timeless image, and its importance resonates just as much today as it did over thirty years ago, when it was captured. The female body, used as subject for many of her works, was and still is a “battlefield for men’s ideological, religious and political rhetoric” (footnote 1). By presenting the subject with a gun to her face, covered in a feminist Arabic poem, whose words act as a veil too, she encapsulates the bravery of the women today who are cutting off their hair in the streets of Iran as a response to their oppression.
Georgia O’Keeffe
Georgia O’Keeffe is probably the greatest modern feminism icon for me. Her name strikes a cord for many, because of her ambiguous flower paintings that have been interpreted as allegories of female genitalia. Her reputation as a ‘flower painter’ is ironic because she previously stated “I hate flowers – I paint them because they’re cheaper than models and they don’t move” (footnote 2). As the wife of the famous pioneer of modern photography, Alfred Stieglitz, her persona was often stifled under the lens of the erotic male gaze. Her work has often been labeled as gender-related, but she has spent most of her career trying to combat this and defining herself on her own terms, as an artist, free from gender. In fact, she often refused to exhibit in female-only exhibitions.
Artemisia Gentileschi
One of the most classic examples of renowned female artists, who reigned during the Baroque period is Artemisia Gentileschi. However, how many of us know her? Her works can be likened in style and technique to those of Caravaggio, whom we all know to be one of the figureheads of this movement. Her work is characterized by intense variations of light (also known as ‘chiaroscuro’), saturated earthy palettes and graphic blood-splattering imagery. As a victim of sexual assault at a very young age, Gentileschi’s extraordinary career was driven by her will to defy the gender gap in the artworld of the 16th century. Her work is considered ground-breaking because of its proto-feminist message, with biblical or mythological subject matter being retold through a female protagonist. Her most famous work, Judith Slaying Holofenes, depicts a very popular subject matter, however unlike earlier representations, Judith is depicted as muscular, ‘manly’ I dare say, as she cold-heartedly plunges a dagger into Holofenes’ neck.
Dame Mary Beard
I would probably define Dame Mary Beard as the Goddess of the world of art and culture. Not only is she the author of many historical pieces, such as SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome or Civilisations: How Do We Look / The Eye of Faith, but she is also a BBC presenter, a Cambridge Classics professor, an editor of the The Times Literary Supplement etc. etc. the list goes on. Her book, Women and Power: A Manifesto, has a clear and simple message: the only way to combat misogyny is not by simply calling it out, but by studying and explaining it, in order to find an effective way to fight it. The root of the problem for her, stems all the way back to the beginning of time: to Ancient Greece and Rome. So, aside from this book being a quest to explain the origins of misogyny and the establishment of the patriarchy, it is also a comprehensive and expansive piece of historical literature that guides you through feminist theory by examining historical events and figures that undoubtedly shaped the way women are today.
Footnotes:
- ‘Róisín Tapponi in Conversation With Shirin Nashat’, CIRCA, 2022
- Georgia O’Keeffe, Portrait of An Artist: A Biography of Georgia O’Keeffe, (Viking Press: New York, 1981), p.180